LimeWire in court: one thing leads to another

The lawsuit train keeps rollin'. Will LimeWire follow in the esteemed tracks …

Observe the indigenous RIAA in its native environment. Fresh off a kill, its thoughts to turn immediately to its next meal... thus the woolly tusked RIAA embodies the cycle of life.

And so it begins again. Just days after Kazaa settled with the MPAA, the International Federation of Phonographic Industries (IFPI), and the RIAA, the music labels are after another P2P application: LimeWire. Labels owned by studio giants Universal Music, Sony BMG, EMI, and Warner Music Group filed suit against Lime Wire LLC in Manhattan on Friday.

The suit alleges that Lime Wire LLC facilitates the illegal sharing of music on its P2P network. Furthermore, drawing on arguments from the infamous MGM vs. Grokster decision at the Supreme Court, the suit also charges Lime Wire with failing to make any material attempt to stop piracy on its network, piracy that the plaintiffs argue Lime Wire not only knew about, but encouraged in order to make their software more popular. The suit seeks damages, including a hefty $150,000 fine for each song illegally traded on the network.

A war of attrition

The gameplan at the RIAA is simply to make it increasingly difficult for average Internet users to find "illicit" P2P. To this end the RIAA has concocted what could be called a "sue 'em straight" plan. The writing is on the wall: if the RIAA has your number, you can try your hand in court, you can settle, or better yet, you can settle and try to go legit.

To this end, the RIAA said that Lime Wire had it coming. "While other services have come productively to the table, LimeWire has sat back and continued to reap profits on the backs of the music community," the RIAA said in a statement. The RIAA contacted Lime Wire in September of last year along with Bearshare and WinMX, reportedly to ask them to go straight. WinMX has essentially folded, while Bearshare transferred its remaining assets to iMesh after paying $30 million to the RIAA. eDonkey and Audiogalaxy have also thrown in the towel.

As far as the recording industry is concerned, companies pushing P2P lose one way or another, as apparently no one actually expects these "reformed" networks to make it once they go legit. For the companies that find themselves in the crosshairs, the RIAA apparently believes that a settlement is the only thing that will leave them with anything to show for their efforts in recent years. Translation: keep the shirt on your back and settle. Such is the attitude throughout the music industry in the wake of the Grokster decision. The next question is, after Lime Wire, who's next?

Ken Fisher / Ken is the founder & Editor-in-Chief of Ars Technica. A veteran of the IT industry and a scholar of antiquity, Ken studies the emergence of intellectual property regimes and their effects on culture and innovation.